Event Description
Michael Weisberg, associate professor of philosophy, University of Pennsylvania
In the 1950s, an amateur musical theater producer named John Reber convinced many powerful Californians that the state's water problems could be solved by damming up the San Francisco Bay. Against massive political pressure, Reber's opponents persuaded lawmakers that doing so would lead to an ecological disaster. They did this not by empirical measurement alone, but through the construction of a working hydraulic model of the San Francisco Bay. Drawing on the story of the Bay Model, this talk examines how models can tell us about the world and be used as guides in decision making. I will defend a similarity account of the model/world relation, and discuss how this relation can form the basis of a confirmation theory for idealized models.
This talk is part of a Science & Society lectures series that is co-sponsored by the Physics Graduate Student Association and the Center for Science, Technology and Society. |
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Location:
Papadakis Integrated Sciences Building, Room 120, 3245 Chestnut Street, Philadelphia, PA 19104 |
Audience:
Graduate StudentsSenior ClassProspective StudentsInternational StudentsFacultyStaffAlumniParents & Families |
Special Features:
Free Food |
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